I've just re-read these trades (just about to start the Mark Millar run) and I have to plump for Stormwatch, I'm afraid.
Jenny Sparks, Jack Hawksmoor and Swift are far more well-rounded as Stormwatch Black than as the Authority, and Midnighter and Apollo work better as shadowy figures on the run, then extracting revenge, than as the team players he makes them later.
Also, the 'Kill God' storyline (Warren's final on the Authority) is just plain daft, whereas the Jenny Sparks solo issue (where she's drawn and written in various styles, from Mk1 Superman, through Dan Dare, Jack Kirby and Watchmen) may well be the best thing Warren Ellis put his pen to pre-Planetary.
Am I alone in thinking this?
― aldo_cowpat (aldo_cowpat), Thursday, 5 August 2004 09:42 (twenty-one years ago)
Also, ROSE TATTOO!
― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 5 August 2004 13:02 (twenty-one years ago)
― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 5 August 2004 13:03 (twenty-one years ago)
Frank Quitely > Bryan Hitch > Oscar Jimenez > Tom Raney
...though I'm basing this hierarchy on work from these four in & out of the SW/Auth axis; I haven't actually seen FQ's work on _The Authority_.
Actually, I'm kinda partial to the Stormwatch series that served as a transition between the old SW and the Authority (especially the WildC.A.Ts / Aliens crossover, wherein the old SW is severely buggered). Getting to the transition point is cool & all, but seemed a little stiff @ times, and the widescreen shenanigans of the Authority were all good & fun (& very impressive), but slightly perfunctory.
One thing re: Ellis' WildStorm work (either w/ Authority or Planetary) is the way he imbues these few select people (the 5 in Authority, the 3 in Planetary & even The Four in Planetary as well) w/ so much power and grandeur in such a simplistic, yet effective & efficient, manner. It's like an idealization of THE downsized, ruthlessly exacting corporate entity, except w/ a small helping of spandex and alien goo.
― David R. (popshots75`), Thursday, 5 August 2004 13:57 (twenty-one years ago)
― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 5 August 2004 14:25 (twenty-one years ago)
Raney really hit his stride on the Change or Die arc, before that I'd've thought you a lunatic for preferring him to Quitley... anyway I just finished this off, the final trade's kinda anti-climactic for a book in which most of the cast get killed, but the best bits of this series (that Jenny Sparks issue, Change or Die) are pretty much the best things I've read of Ellis's. Planetary's kinda as good, but it's so much more aware of itself, the best Stormwatch is just fantastic comics. Why do I keep seeing Ellis listed as one of those guys who hate superheroes? He makes up two of the best Superman ripoffs ever during this run, and displays plenty of affection for them. The High's story is one of the saddest things I've read in comics.
Oh anyway yeah Stormwatch, I liked Millar's Authority more than Ellis's anyway
― Niles Caulder, Sunday, 2 November 2008 13:08 (sixteen years ago)
His insistence on using British slang is pretty annoying, tho. I really doubt Jackson'd tell Winter to "piss off".
― Niles Caulder, Sunday, 2 November 2008 13:10 (sixteen years ago)